Clutch plate



Oct. l, 1946. 'H. NUTT CLUTCH PLATE Filed Oct. 2,- 1944 lmwmwmwmwww Patented Oct. 1, 1946l Harold Nutt, Chicago, Ill., assignor to Borg-War.-

ner Corporation, Chicago, Ill., a corporation of y Illinois Application October 2, 1944, Serial No. 556,710

5 Claims.

The present invention relates to friction clutches of the type Yused in motor vehicles and it has particular reference to a clutch plate cushion arrangement for carrying the friction rings that are pressed toward each other for coupling the driving and driven elements of a clutch.

It is one of the principal objects of this invention to simplify they construction of a friction clutch cushion arrangement such as contemplated herein, and to improve the eiciency, operation, and dependability of such arrangement.

It is also a principal object of this invention to provide a cushion element with an elongated foot for attachment to the supporting disc so that the foot extends along a greater peripheral portion of the disc than has heretofore been possible with prior arrangements. This permits the attaching means or rivets to be widely spaced from each other, and also the use of a cushion member having considerable radial length upon a relatively small diameter mounting, thus reducing to a minimum the shearing movement on the attaching rivets or other means.

A further principal object hereof is to provide the cushion members with attaching feet that overlap the feet of the adjacent or proximate members, thereby reducing the total number of rivets and the operations required toV anchor all of the cushions on'the disc which is d'ue to the fact that the overlappedfeet portions will require only one rivetV at each overlapped region.

Another object resides in providing a novel foot portion upon a cushion, such foot portion on agiven cushion being longer than the periph'- eral space upon the mounting disc between the cushion atthe sides of the given disc.

Stillanother object hereof is to provide the attaching feet of the cushions with laterally offset toe portions thereby to accommodate such toes to their overlapping arrangement when mounted on the disc.

- A still further object is to provide a clutch `plate cushion member of .generally rectangular shape that comprises a body portion or wing having a flat radial region preferably adjacent allel to eachother. The straight margin at one side of the body which extends toward the neck is provided with an oblique portion extending inward to the recess to accommodate and lie substantially parallel to the straight side edge of the adjacent cushion member.

Additional objects, aims, and advantages of the invention contemplated herein will be apparent to persons skilled in the art after the construction and operation of the friction clutch cushion arrangement is understood from the within description. It is preferred to accomplish the numerous objects of this invention and to practice the clutch plate improvement viewed on the plane ,of line 2-2of Fig. 1;

Fig.3 is a sectional View on line 3-3 of Fig. 2; and

Fig; 4 is a sectional View on line 4-4 of Fig. 2.

The drawing is to be understood as being more or less of a schematic character for the purpose of; disclosing a typical or preferred form of the improvement contemplated herein. In the drawing like reference characters identify the same Yparts in the different views.

verally rectangular shape that has ar flat region I6 Vextending in a radial direction from its anchored edge. The remaining portion of the cushion plate is bowed as at I1 to provide a freely disposed wing element of concavo-convex section.

The cushion members are adapted to carry the friction creating members I8 and I9 of ring-like form that are mounted upon opposite sides of with the bowed portion Il of the cushion tend-v ing to urge the rings away from each other vso that the friction creating rings will yieldingly respond to lateral pressure exerted against them.

The friction ring i8 lies close to the radial surface of a fiywheel or other driving element 22 and the ring I9 is adapted tov be yieldably moved' v in the direction of the flywheel when the pressure plate or other driving element 23 of the clutch moves longitudinally of the shaft. Thus the clutch plate assembly lconstitutes the intermediate or driven elements of the friction clutch.

As will be seen in Fig. 2, the cushion member I4 has a generally rectangular contour 'with parallel side edges 24 and 25 that are approximately raidally disposed, and the outer margin 25 is an arc that is struck from a radius at the axis. of

The inner or mounting portion of the cushion lis formed with an elongated arcuate foot 2T connected to the wing portion by a neck 28. The side edge 25, as it approaches the foot portion, or about midway its length, is formed with an oblique portion 25a so that this latter portion of the edge extends inwardly of the wing and terminates at the recess 29 that is formed in the cushion member to provide the neck 28. Preferably the neck has a width that is coextensive with the width of the radial iiat region IE upon the cushion member.

The elongated arcuate foot 27 is mounted in overlying relation to the margin of the mounting disc I2 and it is anchored to the disc by rivets I5 that pass through spaced aligned holes in the foot and the disc. The toe of the foot is offset as clearly shown at 3l to permit the toe of a cushion member to be overlapped with the heel portion of the proximate cushion member with the respective holes in register so that a single rivet l5 is employed to anchor these overlapped portions of two cushions to the mounting disc. When mounted in this manner, it will be seen the oblique portion 25a at the left-hand edge `of a cushion will lie close to and `in substantially parallel relation to the straight left-hand edge 2 4 of the next cushion. This arrangement dispo-ses the outer corner regions 32 and 33 of adjacent cushions in close relation to each other. Also, it will be apparent that the supercial varea of the series of cushions Ais materially increased over such areas as are provided in `prior structures, and this is accomplished without sacricing the strength or dependability of the cushion members. Furthermore, the main body portions or free wings of the assembled cushions lie close to each other, and a dependable and more rigid mounting is eiected due to the elongation '4 of the feet so that they have overlapped end portions which are connected to the mounting disc by one rivet and a single riveting operation.

While I have described my invention in connection with one specific embodiment thereof, it is to be understood that this is by way. of illustration and not by way of limitation and the scope of my invention is dened solely by the appended claims which should be construed as broadly as the prior art will permit.

I claim:

1. A friction clutch plate cushion element of ysubstantially rectangular shape that comprises a wing portionv having a at radial region adjacent a side edge and a bowed region of greater extent than the flat region, the side edges of said wing having parallel portions and one of said edges having an inwardly extending oblique portion; a narrow neck portion forming a continuation of the flat win-g region; an elongated foot portion extending lateral .to said lneck portion for eiecting anchorage of the cushion element on a support; and an oiset region at an end of said foot portion.

2. A friction clutch plate cushion element as dened in claim 1 wherein the offset portion of the foot comprises a toe at the end of the foot remote to the neck and positioned beyond the adjacent end of the oblique edge portion of said wing.

3. A friction clutch plate comprising a mounting disc; cushion elements arranged in annular array on the peripheral region of said disc, said cushion elements each embodying aowing portion having a fiat radial region adjacent one edge and a bowed region of greater extent than said flat region, the side edges of said win-g having parallel portions and one of said side edges having an inwardly extending oblique portion; a narrow neck portion forming a continuation of said flat radial wing region; an elongated foot portion extending lateral to said neck portion in overlying relation to the peripheral region of said disc; an oiiset region at an end of said foot portion overlapping the foot portion of an adjacent cushion element; anchoring means passed through said disc and the overlapping regions of the cushion elements; and friction facin-gs on 0pvposite sides of said cushion elements,'one of said facings secured to the ilat radial regions of said cushion elements, and the other of said facings secured to the bowed regions of `said'cushion ele'- ments.

4. A frictionclutch plate as defined in claim 3 wherein the offset region of the foot comprises a toe at the end of the foot remote to the neck and positioned beyond the adjacent end of the oblique edge portion of said wing.

5. A friction clutch plate as deiined in claim 3 wherein the bowed region of the wing is spaced radially outward from the periphery of the disc; and the oiiset region of the foot comprises an apertured toe at the end of the foot remote to the neck and beyond the adjacent end of the oblique .edge portion of .said wing.

HAROLD 

